HCPL reaches 4 mil circ in a fiscal year– A good excuse for cake!

From July 2007 to May 29th 2008 Harford County Public Library circulated 4 million items.

WOW.

That means everyone did a great job choosing items, processing items, checking in and out items, delivering items, directing people to items and supporting those that do.

To think just a couple of years ago, we did 3 million!

Now that is an excuse for some cake. Yum.

My Geek Free Weekend

This past weekend, between the second job, grandchild and gardening I had an unplanned and oddly enjoyable weekend away from technology.

No Computer. No personal or work email. No blogging, viewed blogs or Feed reading.  No ESPN.com.  No Twitter. No nuttin’.

The only “technology” I used was my cell phone to tell me the time and my DVR box to watch Casino Royale (2006) really really late on Sunday Night.

I was so busy, I didn’t notice that I had been away from my lifeline my computer until last night when  I thought…gee, I wonder who won the Division 1 lacrosse championship?

Not a traditional moment of clarity for most folks I know, but it worked.   

Now I am back to technology for work and school with a greater realization that there is something outside the world of zero’s and one’s.

Here is our Maryland Library Association Presentation: Creating a Technology Petting Zoo

presented at the 2008 Maryland Library Association Annual Live and Virtual Conferences by Annette G. and myself.

Twitter=Yo-Yo

Its Up.  Its Down. Its Up. Its Down.  (at 4:44 Eastern, May 21st, 2008-down)

Yes, I am talking about twitter.  The fantab microblogging service that can be so much more.  If  it was not powered by four gerbils on a wheel.

Check here if twitter is up or down.  istwitterdown.com.

It is great.  So what if clicking the answer redirects you to someone’s book on Amazon.

Twitter helped my life better:

Twitter made my world a little better by getting me a response from cable giant Comcast.

Here is the conversation from Twitter:

baldgeekinmd (angry this morning after being told I was NOT elligible for the Triple Play package for almost the same price as I pay for my cable and internet at home):
@comcastcares (comcast on twitter) Dear Comcast, I pay you $170 a month, why can’t I get the triple play deal too? I feel hosed. kthanksbye

The response:

comcastcares @baldgeekinmd I can get that for you. XX_XXX_XXXX@cable.comcast.com

I bow down to the power of a hooked up cable company.  And they just sent me an email to follow up.  I will talk to them tonight.

W00t and yeah twitter.

And here 101 Everyday Uses for Twitter. Thanks travelinlibrarian for the link.

MLA Post IV — About Last Night

What do you get when you mix smart librarians, drinking strong mixed adult beverages, answering challenging quiz questions delivered by acerbic and dry host in a fun atmosphere?

Why you have Maryland Library Association’s Pub Night featuring questions about Maryland’s literary history, general knowledge and other great questions. There was even an audio daily double round.

And let’s not forget great team names. For example, there was the team of the Seven Bras, later amended to the Seven Bitter Bra’s after a ruling on a question did not go in their favor.

And then there was my team.

The Pirate King and his Seven Wenches.

We were a juggernaut. Won three of the five multiple question quiz rounds. One of our wins featured five tie breakers.

Congrats to my team mates, all from Harford Co. except one nice lady we adopted from St. Mary’s County Public Library. They are Jenn J; Liz P; Megan B; Linda L; Donna S; Debbie R.

I am so glad to work with such brilliant, quick, funny and talented people.

We should return next year to defend the title.

MLA Post III — Everything You Wanted to Know about IT

The session is Everything you wanted to know about IT. It was an open session for all manner of question for library IT staff. Something we could do at HCPL.

Participants: Lisa McKenney, Allegany Co Public, Karl McFarland, Prince Georges County Library, Michelle Robertson, Anne Arundel Community College, Eli Fulkerson, Eastern Shore Regional Library and moderated by Scott Reinhart of Carroll County Public Library.

First up: What is the toughest thing about managing hundreds of pc’s?

“flip answer” the hundreds who work on them. Real answer: Balancing what they want to do with what we (IT) want them to do on them. Public side: PC’s are kept locked down but staff PC’s are more open and they are able to administer their personal computer. That way they can take some responsibility for their computers so they can learn some things about them. Virus issues are usually captured before they get to the computer. One system reimages their public pc’s twice a year. That process if facilitated by PC being replaced at about the same time.

Next question: Is there something that you deployed that did not work?

First, there was bit of talk about Windows Vista. Some systems deployed it early and found their equipment wanting. They then ramped back to XP and use converters to open Vista documents for clients in some cases.
Allegany IT’s Lisa talked about Face to Face meeting. That was one piece of software that they did not like the way it choked their system when using for more than six users. I really slowed down so they could not use it. They have scrapped using face to face but are trying to use Skype’s services for additional phone connections and are exploring using video conferencing software. They think it is an alternative to Face to Face.

Question: Resolving printer issues.
One way is the old fashioned Ping of the machine, once you know the printer’s IP address. If your basic troubleshooting fails, just inform your IT staff so they can help you further.

Question: How can I get my system to Install Firefox on our machines?
Get support of Admin staff, Come up with things that are better in Firefox than IE. Also, if you don’t have your IT folks on board, work with and possibly around them with vaild reasons for public deployment.

Question: What about staff wanting to use 2.0 tools while IT staff want to be more cautious about use.

One way is to get them on board is to talk about how these tools will help productivity. Talk to them about the benefit of using what the internet has to offer. You can also do this: Tell them “here is this thing we want to do.” Here is a free service that does it. Do you want to do this and can it be done by this date we want to roll it out?”

Question: What is the aversion to macs in the library?

Some systems have a handful of macs dedicated to design work seamlessy working with Win based networks. Also, to date, ILS’s were/are geared to PC based machines. That is changing with the advent of Mac’s and Open Source.

Question: What about an Open source ILS in your library.

Two systems talked about their experience. One reason they switched was the ability to tailor user experience with Open Source. Kent and Howard are going live in two weeks and by Christmas respectivley.
Kent and Howard had the rug pulled out from under them by SirsiDynix and went to move to another service.
Howard is doing some development with an acquisitons system and wants to let customer seek no differfence between book and website.
There are acq. issues, staffing issues, etc with Open ILS’s. Koha needs to work with a multiple branch system. When that happens, that will help acceptance.

Question: Why don’t more systems use IM system wide?

Allegany has used IM for over 6 years. Big system users have accounts. The system director, materials manager, finance, etc. had accounts. They have used IM for material holds (that was the method at that time)
Also great for small systems as an alternative means of communication between branches and through hierarchy. The ability to quickly ask “can you take a call?” via IM to director or finance department saves time and easily increases availability.
Most staff just launch IM when starting their computers and they use AIM. There will be side chatter going on by they have not had many issues with the IM Service.  If you have staff using phones for chatter, they will use IM’s for chatter.  SLRC’s Sights and Sounds at SLRC uses IM for requsting items.

Question:  What are things on the horizon for IT.

Many devices becoming one device, Information directly to the patron in the branch via text. Most Important:  No one knows what is coming down the pike. You have to prepare for it with IT.

MLA Post II

Annette and I just this last hour delivered out virtual conference presentation “Creating a Technology Petting Zoo” for about 20 folks from all around Maryland.

It seemed to very well and our producer was fantab.

MLA 2008: Post I

This is the first post from MLA (Maryland Library Association) Conference 2008 in the resort town of Ocean City MD.  First rule: What happens in OC stays in OC.

I am writing this from outside the vendor area listening to the “Girl from Ipanema Beach”  On Steel Drums.   Yes, this is in Ocean City MD.

New Member Meeting:

Hearing from MLA member chair talking about the importance of networking at a conference.  And pumping up the Maryland Library Association.  And teasing us with tales of stories of going to China with ALA in 1985.

His quote and conference mantra: “We do not do bail or bond…everything else is fair game.”

Western Maryland Regoinal Library Training Coordinator is talking about the Virtual Confernece
provided by Learning Times.  And mentioned the ahem..”crisis” this morning.

There is free access for MLA live conference attendees to access content for one year.   Cool.

MLA and Virtual Conference blog is here: http://www.learningtimes.net/mlablog/

I am checking out the Vendors and the now moved Virtual Conference session.  Update: I now have a boomerang for my grandson to play with and a bright shiny star for my namebadge.

Also, the new Ocean City library is gorgeous.

As is the conference hotel.  But now all I want is reliable wireless.  Is that too much to ask?  And for my Axim to pick up wireless.  I am so frustrated by the device, it may take an unintended swim in the ocean this morning.

And I want my camera, which I left at home to “travel light”.  Not the smartest move.

More later.

On my way to MLA 08

After a mid-week wedding in Annapolis, Mrs. Bald Trainer and I will be on the way to beautiful Ocean City MD for the Maryland Library Association Annual confab.

I will be doing two presentations, one during the virtual conference and one during the actual conference.  She will be reading and lying on the beach.

Of course, I will be blogging all about here. If you want, you can also follow my twitter feed at http://twitter.com/baldgeekinmd.

If you are coming to the conference, say howdy.

bald erratta – some new flotsam from the intertubes

Kool twitterfind: http://producten.hema.nl/ *from David Rothman

I enthusiastically suggested browbeat a friend of mine into blogging. My friend’s new blog: Technology from the Non-Techie

Slideshare is on twitter: Yeah!

Meme This: Passion Quilt Meme Question

If more kids and adults were encouraged to ask questions, there would be much more sharing of knowledge and less assuming throughout the land.  Kids (and adults) need to be encouraged to ask intelligent questions about what they are curious about.  This develops a lifelong curiosity that works well in our ever changing world.  Heck, remember that 12 year ago, people laughed if you had a website.

I also repeatedly encourage trainees to ask any question that they have throughout my classes.  Why? I have found that if someone has a question in a class, there is at least one other trainee thinking about something similar, and neither of them are actually paying attention to the class itself.

Also, as a trainer, I have failed in my job if someone leaves the training with an unanswered question.

Now, that said, they are also responsible for asking that question, since I have not passed the Karnak certification test.  It is almost impossible to answer a question that is unasked.

That is what I am passionate about.  Raise  your hand! Ask the question!

I got double tagged (thanks Library Trainer and MLibrarianUs) with this meme about what you are passionate about kids learning. Known origin of the meme is here.

The topic? Post a picture from a source like FlickrCC or Flickr Creative Commons or make/take your own that captures what YOU are most passionate about for kids to learn about…and give your picture a short title.

So, if you read this blog you know sometimes I have a wicked independent streak (yet I answered this question..go figure).  So, I am not tagging anyone else officially.  If you have something you are passionate about kids learning, create an image, blog about it and link back to this post.

So..I tag you all….go forth and meme!

Yes, Virginia it IS a Web….

Twitter, the micro-blogging service that can be used to keep you friends up to date on your minutiae or tapped as the hive-mind creates many common social network strands. The site tweetwheel.com makes those relationships visible.

Very visible.

My complete tweetwheel is here: baldgeekinmd’s wheel. Thanks to The Strange Librarian for dropping this in my twitter feed..

UPDATE: Seems as Twitterwheel had gotten so popular it has overwhelmed its servers. It runs really really really slow or looks like the site has disappeared.

Innanet Growing Painz.

Update of the Update: Bugs seem to be fixed.

And yes, I drive a pickup.

This is what gas prices look like to me.